7 secret & not so secret sperm killers

So you finally had the tests run and here is the verdict: his swimmers are slow, they are few, and oh, they also look funny. It can be a crushing experience for a man to hear that he is unlikely to get his wife pregnant. The worst may just be though, that usually not much treatment can be offered because the underlying cause is not clear. Well, let me tell you, there definitely are some clear root causes of poor sperm quality and you absolutely CAN improve it naturally and quickly. In this post I’m helping you figure out what may be going on so that you can get a clue about what may be going on for you and how it can be fixed. The 7 secret and not so secret sperm killers!

Sperm killer 1: Stress

Let’s kick this off with one of the most well known & obvious ones: Stress. I am almost starting to feel like a broken record with this increasingly generic term. Everything is stress this stress that. The thing is, I can’t stress (haha) enough how stress majorly affects your hormone balance. Yes, both for men and women! Chronic stress makes your body produce stress hormones at the expense of sex hormones.

You may know FSH as the Follicle Stimulating Hormone that is needed to mature eggs in an ovary and LH (luteinising homorne) to trigger ovulation, but those very same hormones in a guy are needed to produce sperm!

Another important male hormone is testosterone. This one too drops when the body needs to produce more stress hormones.

To address stress with my male patients, I therefore work with remedies to support the:

Adrenal glands – the ones that produce either stress or sex hormones

Hypothalamus – I call this the hormone boss because he/she is the one that translates stress to the hormone system and decides what and how much of hormones the other glands produce

Anterior pituitary gland – which produces FSH &LH

Testes – the ones producing the sperm

Quite a few studies have shown how stress drastically reduces sperm count. Stress however also causes what is called “oxidative stress” which can affect the quality of sperm. Oxidative stress is basically a disruption in a body’s metabolism to effectively detox. Stress can therefore be an extra problem if there is already toxicity in the body.

Sperm killer 2: History of malaria or malaria medication

I’d range this one under the secret sperm killers as this is a nasty one that you may not have connected to sperm quality! Unfortunately in the third world it is a lot more known and common that malaria affects sperm quality. The good news is that you can absolutely recover from it! The thing is though…. you actually need to recover from it and not have it slumber away in the background.

That malaria drugs affects male fertility is also a known fact that is unfortunately not always communicated.

Homeopathy can both help you recover if you’ve never been really well since having malaria, and detox malaria medication.

Sperm killer 3: Infections (candida & STD’s)

Have you gotten tested for an STD yet? If either of you have had other bed partners than each other, then you’re going to want to have this checked out. Too often are STD’s not picked up on because couples don’t get tested and don’t have symptoms. The fact is, however, even old untreated STD’s can completely ruin your fertility. It will kill sperm before it manages to leave a guy’s body and it can cause mucus buildup in a woman’s Fallopian tubes, making it imposible for sperm to even travel up or an egg to travel down. So do yourselves a favor, be open and honest with each other and get screened.

Another big problem is candida. We all have this in our bodies all the time, but when it overgrows it can cause problems. You may then know it as a yeast or fungal infection or thrush. The tricky thing is that especially for guys, this can be a problem without him experiencing symptoms! If you have any or several of the following apply to you:

Sugar / carbohydrate rich diet

You drink a lot of caffeine and / or alcohol

Have a history of smoking cannabis

Have digestive issues such as bloating, gas and / or recurring loose stools

…then you likely have a candida overgrowth! Check out the suggestions at the bottom of this post for women on treating thrush. The same tips apply to guys wanting to resolve candida overgrowth.

Sperm killer 4: (Past) use of steroids

There is another not so well-known one: the use of steroids. Because steroids are synthetic hormones, they disrupt the natural hormone balance and that disruption can linger even after you’ve stopped taking the steroids. This is the case again both for women and men! So whether it was in the cortisone cream for eczema or in the form of asthma inhalers, or just for an infection that would not shift, consider a homeopathic detox for sure if you have been taking steroids.

Sperm killer 5: Metal toxicity

This is especially a big one for poor quality of sperm. Couples that struggle with known poor sperm quality, or recurring (missed) miscarriages often suffer with metal toxicity. Unfortunately this problem is not as well known as I wish it were. I think that if more couples knew about it and had access to homeopathic detoxing, a lot of suffering and grief could be prevented. Because although metal toxicity almost seems impossible to fix, detoxing homeopathically can almost work miraculoulsy in these cases!

Metal toxicity can be picked up on through hair testing but honestly often I detox couples without a test. If I see enough signs of metal toxicity, and a couple doesn’t care much about the testing, we’ll usually just go ahead with a detox and then see them improve, conceive and have healthy babies.

If any of the following applies to you, you likely struggle with metal toxicity:

Having (had) silver dental fillings

Work with heavy metal

Smoking or have smoked in the past (even e-smokers)

Living in the city

Cooking in tin foil and/or using

Often getting abscesses that are hard to clear or getting (mouth) ulcers

Sperm killer 6: Past inflammation, mumps or trauma to the testicles

These may seem oddly grouped, but in essence they have the same end result: damaged testicles. Boys that get mumps, can also get orchitis (= testicle inflammation) which can lead to shrinkage. You can imagine that shrinkage would affect their functioning!

The same applies to any other inflammations or injuries. A guy will know when he’s had an inflamamtion because I have been told by patients how excruciating it is and I’ve seen their absolute joy when a homeopathic remedy resolves it.

Whether it is an ongoing latent inflammation that is unresolved, or if there is scar tissue in the testicles, homeopathy can definitely make a big difference and get you a few more good swimmers!

Sperm killer 7: Varicocele

I’d call this one secret and not secret. Varicocele (varicose veins in scrotum) are often considered as a infertility factors on one hand, but on the other hand I find that a lot of doctors tell their patients that their varicocele won’t affect their fertility. In my experience as a fertility homeopath however they often do affect fertility. A varicose vein is different from the way it is supposed to be; it is wider and causes more blood to circulate in a certain area. Blood circulation however needs to be perfect to have exactly the right temperature of sperm because overheating even slightly can ruin them (that’s where the loose briefs and no-jacuzzi rules come from!).

Therefore if a patient comes in with known varicocele, I will treat those in the same way as patients with varicose veins in their legs or with haemerrhoids. With all of these vein conditions I have seen homeopathy help the veins restore themselves and shrink to a normal size. Never ceases to amaze me!